Transcribe a 3-hour YouTube video from the link alone.
You have a YouTube video that runs three hours and you want it as text. Paste its link in the box below: there is no download, the whole video comes back as one transcript in about 6 minutes, and a single video can run up to 10 hours. The first 20 minutes are free, and a pack from $6 finishes the rest from where the preview stopped.
What the link gets you
A three-hour video, read in the time it takes to make coffee.
No download step
The audio is fetched from YouTube on our side, so your laptop never holds a 3 GB video file and your upload speed does not matter. Public and unlisted videos both work, as do watch links, short youtu.be links and replays of past live streams.
Ten hours is the ceiling
A video up to 10 hours long goes through as one job with one clock. Conference archives, full-day courses and marathon podcasts recorded on camera all fit. Anything longer than that is better sent as two videos, each with its own transcript.
Six minutes for three hours
Processing runs at roughly 2 minutes per hour of audio, so a 3-hour video is usually ready in about 6 minutes. On our public proof page, a 9.31-hour recording finished in 1,033 seconds. You can close the tab and come back to it.
Jump to the part you needed
Three hours of text is a lot to scroll. Each video comes back with a brief that states the thesis and the takeaways, chapters with timestamps, the names and numbers spoken, and a chat you can ask about the video.
Why long videos are awkward
The usual route through a three-hour video, and the shorter one.
✗ Download, convert, split
Most tools want a file, and the file they want is smaller than the one YouTube will give you.
- Find a downloader you trust
- Wait for a multi-gigabyte save
- Strip the audio to get under an upload cap
- Cut it into hour-long pieces
- Read auto-captions with no punctuation
- Stitch three documents back together
✓ Paste the link once
The video stays on YouTube. You hand over the address and get the text back.
- One link, no saved file
- Up to 10 hours in one job
- Punctuated sentences with timestamps
- Chapters that follow the topics
- The first 20 minutes free to check quality
- One document with a single timeline
Sample output
Three hours in, the timestamps still line up with the video.
Illustrative output, not a real video. Every line carries the time it was said in the video, so you can paste a timestamp into the player and land on that sentence.
Export
One transcript. Five clean formats.
Every pack exports all five — no format is held back for a higher tier.
Plain text
De-ummed paragraphs. Ready to paste.
SRT captions
Timed to the speech. Every video editor reads this.
WebVTT
HTML5 player + YouTube uploads.
Show notes
Formatted with chapters and pull-quotes.
Machine-readable
Timestamped text for your own tools.
Pricing
Honest pricing, no surprises.
A pack from $6 (500 minutes) opens the full transcript. After that, no subscription and no auto-renew — every tier is a one-time minute pack, and credits never expire. Buy once, use the minutes whenever you need them.
Casual pack
$6/500 min
8 hours of audio — $0.72 an hour. One-time — credits never expire.
- 500 minutes of audio
- All export formats
- Unlimited AI chat per transcript
- Executive summary & key quote
Best value
$12/2,000 min
33 hours of audio — $0.36 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 2,000 minutes of audio
- Priority queue
- All export formats
- Unlimited AI chat per transcript
Bulk pack
$24/5,000 min
83 hours of audio — $0.29 an hour. Credits never expire.
- 5,000 minutes of audio
- Priority queue
- API access for batch pipelines
- All export formats
FAQ
Long YouTube videos, answered.
How long does a 3-hour YouTube video take to transcribe?
Around 6 minutes, at about 2 minutes per hour of audio. A 1-hour talk is usually done in about 2 minutes and a 10-hour archive in about 20.
What will a 3-hour video cost?
Three hours is 180 minutes. The first 20 minutes are free on your first visit, and the $6 pack of 500 minutes covers the rest of this video with 320 minutes left for the next one. Credits never expire and there is no subscription.
Is there a rule for YouTube live replays over 6 hours?
Yes. A recorded live stream longer than 6 hours starts once a pack is on your account, so the preview does not run first. An ordinary uploaded video of the same length is not a stream replay and follows the normal free preview.
What is the longest YouTube video I can paste?
Ten hours. A video longer than that should be split on YouTube's side into two videos, or downloaded and sent as two files.
Does it work for videos that are not in English?
It does. The spoken language is detected automatically across 99 languages, and you do not choose anything before pasting the link.
Which formats can I download, and is my video private?
TXT, DOCX, SRT, VTT and JSON. The SRT and VTT files can go straight back to YouTube as captions. Recordings are transcribed on our own servers and are never used for training.
Related
More for long videos.
Paste the YouTube link. Read the three hours in six minutes.
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